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Author Topic: Bye Bye Valenti Steve Scott Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1300 From: Minneapolis, MN Registered: Sep 2000 posted 07-02-2004 02:45 PM                     Let's pool some cash and buy the SOB a DV cam as a retirement gift  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 07-02-2004 03:24 PM                     Jhawk, you and I both know you will sit and have a lovely politically correct chit chat and tea all day long with anyone in the world, even someone as warm and fuzzy as Saddam. You also know that couldn't be further away from my "cut the crap" style. This is why you never seem to be able to understand my point. Let's look at the meat of it, without the tea and without the PC nonsense. Valenti damn near pops a vein anytime pirating is brought into a speech. Geez, he isn't talking to a bunch of criminals awaiting paroll! He is talking to the very people who are in the industry who pirating affects. He accuses the theater owners/managers/staff of being responsible for 90-92% of all bootlegs out there, when any idiot knows that most bootlegs are from studio screeners. This is the biggest beef I and everyone else I have talked to have with this geezer. It's one thing to send out information packets requesting the assistance of theater personnel to help catch pirates, but he is going about it completely the wrong way and I don't think I know of anyone who works at a commercial theater that doesn't detest the man. Nowadays we get security guards escorting the film prints to the screning dates just an hour or two before the show. Hardly any time to do a proper and full inspection, much less a pre-screening to catch any issues (which I believe bit the people at New Line in the ass at a screening of ROTK last year). This is incredibly inconvenient and insulting to the theater staff who must be treated like criminals...but that's not all. Now we have people wandering the theaters with night vision goggles, of which is insulting to the audience, and it IS distracting! But hey, nothing beats the full probing and damn near strip search that is being done these days just to enter the auditorium. No watches, no phones, no purses. I mean really, THESE PEOPLE ARE NOT CRIMINALS! This is the kind of treatment that our old pal Valenti has brought us, and fuck him for that. See the problem? And please do us all a favor and leave the "he's just a spokesman" crap out of this. He took the job and with that comes the responsibility as being "the MPAA guy". Few people have enough spare time nor care enough to research precisely who is the driving force behind this insulting madness that the MPAA has brought on. Besides, Valenti is the spokesman, not whoever this other guy is...so any way you slice it, as far as the people in the field are concerned, it's Valenti's fault. The replacement guy may be just as big of an ass, or bigger (is that possible?) than Valenti himself. That still won't stop the masses from celebrating when September 1st hits. Hopefully he will have a clue and see that the current Valenti-type of attitude is NOT the solution and will start treating the people who work in this industry, as well as the patrons of this industry with a little respect. That's the only way they will get the kind of support that the MPAA and the studios really need to put an end to this pirating nonsense. (The MPAA needs a representative who is not a puppet, someone who is not overly PC, and someone with a brain who isn't afraid to stand up in a meeting and throw this sort of thing that I just explained on the table. I've got my fingers crossed for this next guy.)  |  IP: Logged Joe Redifer You need a beating today Posts: 12859 From: Denver, Colorado Registered: May 99 posted 07-02-2004 05:49 PM                        I think J-h.a.w.k. is just frazzed because he actually got to speak to THE Jack Valenti. He probably thinks that being at/from MIT makes him count a li'l more as well. It only makes his observations count less (much less) because like I said, he doesn't work in a real theater under real circumstances. If you don't feel like discussing the "issue", why did you bring it up? Geez! Some people's kids.  |  IP: Logged Dennis Udovich Film Handler Posts: 71 From: Sheboygan, WI, USA Registered: Dec 2001 posted 07-04-2004 02:10 PM                        Valenti will be attending and speaking at the NATO Great States Convention, Lake Geneva, WI, Sept. 22. Managers and executives of Marcus Theatres will be attending this event during our Fall Manager's Meeting.  |  IP: Logged Phil Hill I love my cootie bug Posts: 7595 From: Hollywood, CA USA Registered: Mar 2000 posted 07-04-2004 04:12 PM                  "What're ya gonna do with those pies, boys?" ( Killer Klowns From Outer Space ) >>> Phil  |  IP: Logged Leo Enticknap Film God Posts: 7474 From: Loma Linda, CA Registered: Jul 2000 posted 07-04-2004 04:39 PM                        quote: Brad Miller He accuses the theater owners/managers/staff of being responsible for 90-92% of all bootlegs out there, when any idiot knows that most bootlegs are from studio screeners. Let's turn this problem on its head and ask not what the source is for the pirated content, but how does it reach its customers? I can't believe that the industry (apart, possibly, from the soon-to-be-claiming-his-pension Jack Valenti) seriously believes that the odd teenager who camcorders a film to show to a few friends represents a serious economic threat. The real problem are the criminal gangs who obtain the content (through screeners or any other way) and then duplicate it on an industrial scale. I was reading this book last weekend. The author noted that the earliest known form of systematic piracy emerged during the late teens/early 20s, and involved quite simply stealing 35mm release prints, exporting them to countries where that film hadn't been released yet and distributing them illegally (in some cases the distribution wasn't even illegal - this was long before the Berne Convention and the necessary copyright laws often hadn't been passed). Almost a century later, it seems that the same thing is happening, only with updated technology. For example in 1995, it was estimated that over 90% of the VHS copies of Hollywood films sold in China were bootleg copies. And these weren't produced by a few daisy-chained VCRs in someone's garage - they're made in full-scale duplication plants, operated openly and with the full knowledge of the authorities. I'd guess that it just wouldn't make economic sense to try and stop small numbers of pirate copies made by private individuals in the developed world for themselves and perhaps one or two others. The money you'd need to spend on doing so - either on a technological solution or 'zero tolerance' law enforcement - wouldn't justify the return in increased sales of legitimate copies. But it might make sense for Valenti's successor to try going after the organised criminals instead. For example, slapping a 500% import tariff on Chinese consumer electronics until the authorities there close down the illegal DVD pressing plants might be a start.  |  IP: Logged Will Kutler Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1506 From: Tucson, AZ, USA Registered: Feb 2001 posted 07-04-2004 05:51 PM                     Some time ago I saw an interview with some big-shot from the MPAA...I think it was Valenti, but have since forgotton. Anyhow, there was some major brujaja over some film that should have received an "X" rating. Instead, the MPAA gave it an "R" rating because the extreme sexuality was done in an "artistic" sense. During the interview, once again I think it was Valenti, was being grilled about this situation, and he staunchly defended his decision. Then the question was asked...Did you personally view the film before approving this rating? Towhich he responded "No."  |  IP: Logged John Hawkinson Film God Posts: 2273 From: Cambridge, MA, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 08-13-2004 01:18 PM                     Back in early July, I said, "I have a call in to the MPAA public affairs office asking them whether they stand behind the 92% stat that the Associated Press published (in Paul's link)." (This being about the allegation that 92% of online and worldwide film piracy is camcorder-derived.) My results were not very satisfactory. According to the MPAA Public Affairs department, the 92% figure is an old number from an old study and a new study is in progress. --jhawk  |  IP: Logged John Pytlak Film God Posts: 9987 From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922 Registered: Jan 2000 posted 08-13-2004 01:28 PM                        At least they answered your question, and were upfront about doing a new study. What would the percentage represent? The number of features pirated? Or the number of pirated copies found?  |  IP: Logged Christian Appelt Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 505 From: Frankfurt, Germany Registered: Dec 2001 posted 08-13-2004 05:54 PM                     Don't worry about Valenti's successor. They propably just did a brain transplant...  |  IP: Logged

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